


Circle of Steel: Thorne Hunter

by Omnibard



Series: Circle of Steel [1]
Category: Fallout 4
Genre: Alaska, Multi, OC History Summary, Sino-American War, Survivor Guilt, Vault 111
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-30
Updated: 2016-05-30
Packaged: 2018-07-11 04:03:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7027753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Omnibard/pseuds/Omnibard





	Circle of Steel: Thorne Hunter

In a culture where boys were expected to grow into men that were both ‘men’s men’ and ‘lady killers’, Thorne Hunter had no hopes of ever really  _ being _ that man.  He also never seemed to have the  _ desire _ .  As a child, while other boys his age were interested in comics and baseball, he preferred poetry and long walks alone.  He had no interest in sports and little interest in study, but  _ less _ interest in the disapproval of his parents, so did what he could on  _ that _ front.

His father put him in Little League.  He didn’t last the season.  The players bullied him and the coach called him ‘too spacey’.

His father was embarrassed.  He called him a ‘wimp’.  Mrs. Hunter knew better: Thorne was  _ brave _ but he was also  _ gentle. _  He lacked the ambitious competitiveness of other boys.  Mr. Hunter said that just sounded like ‘laziness’.

Thorne befriended stray animals on his long walks.  They were drawn to his patience and mildness.  When he came home with dogs, cats, puppies, kittens, and the occasional raccoon, his father was ashamed.  Thorne did not protest or cry when he chased the animals away again, and this shamed Mr. Hunter even more.  Thorne simply stopped bringing home strays.

As he grew, and continued to be less of the person American culture and his father wanted him to be, all while the rationing from the war continued to strangle out business, Mr. Hunter turned to drink and chems.

“It would be different if you were some egg-headed genius, but your grades don’t show it!  Get your head out of the clouds and  _ do _ something with your time!”

Thorne was twelve the first time his father struck him in anger.  He didn’t cry, he didn’t protest.  His mother screamed a short cry of shock, but Thorne just picked himself up, mumbled a quiet apology, and left the house for a long walk.

He never said much to anyone, but on occasion he would talk to his mother about things, and show great insight: in their neighbors, in current events, in the spiritual state of mankind and their never ending thirst for  _ more _ .  Mrs. Hunter would come away from these talks amazed, wishing she had the eloquence-- or perhaps just the  _ courage _ \-- to share these things with her husband.

Teenhood and secondary school brought new challenges.  Being the quiet, mild boy no longer sufficed and was no longer a  _ survivable _ state of being.  Were Thorne truly a  _ lazy _ or  _ stupid _ boy, he would not have understood the issue and adapted to his new, more dangerous surroundings.  He learned two things: how to defend himself in a fistfight for when the bullies came-- and they  _ never failed _ to come, and how to wear a mask to turn his years of quiet insight into biting sarcasm.

He gathered acquaintances with his peers with the second, but also alienated his teachers and mother further.

At fifteen, after making an aside comment to his mother about his father’s drinking, which was overheard, Mr. Hunter punched his son in the face.  Thorne once again said nothing.  He stood up while his mother said something quietly about how ‘he ought not have lipped-off about his father’, and went for a walk.

He did not return.

Instead he walked to Maine, then down to Florida.  He didn’t know if his parents or the police were looking for him, for nobody ever approached him about it.  It took him almost a year to reach Key West, as he stopped for days at a time to resupply by doing yard and house work for families too poor to afford the services.  Once he spent the day reading poetry to an old folks home.  One week he helped a farmer whose barn had burned down.

Once arriving in Florida, he walked the beaches, contemplating his journey.  Then he started west, unhurried.

He was eighteen when he reached Texas.  The Chinese were still in Alaska.  Thorne enlisted in the Army without any driving sense of patriotism, only the simple ideals that if he didn’t do his part, he might never get a chance to  _ see _ Alaska on his next long walk, and also the notion that the natives in Alaska probably needed an awful lot of help about now.

Basic training was hard-- as he suspected it might be.  It was secondary school and his father all rolled into one.  Through a careful balance of sarcasm, silence, and hard work in things that honestly interested him  _ very little _ , Private Hunter scraped through and survived to graduation.  His witticisms made him somewhat popular with his peers once again, but their comraderie was skin-deep at best.

Slotted immediately as an infantryman, Thorne was sent to Alaska to patrol service roads to the Anchorage oil lines.  He, personally, killed six Chinese soldiers in six months before being sent back to the mainland for advanced training.  Someone had noted his nascent absorption of the Chinese language as well as his ability to walk tirelessly and alertly for  _ hours. _

Training him as a deep-insertion scout, they put him under and intelligence officer and sent him back to Alaska.  This time he went to Anchorage proper, where the Chinese were still holding ground.  In two years, he killed only two more Chinese soldiers, and then in 2072 he was sent with the first package to China.  He hadn’t wanted to go,  _ especially _ not to assist the cavalry units equipped with the new ‘power armor’ suits, but as was his usual, he made no real protest.  There, he killed ten Chinese soldiers in two weeks-- one of them close and grisly with a knife, and witnessed the deaths of  _ thousands _ of men, women and children.  Many were targets identified based on  _ his _ intel.  His witty mask quickly crumbled under the horrors he saw, and his ideals seemed to bleed away with every passing hour.  His comrades noticed the marked difference and asked after him, but he’d just shake his head.

Then one day he was gathering intel in a neighborhood known for trafficking supplies and squirreling soldiers into advantageous positions to attack the sector the armors held.  He’d been grooming these locals for weeks and had established a good rapport with his kindness and mildness-- so  _ unlike _ the other soldiers.  They were more reticent and seemed more nervous now, and Thorne had attributed it to the presence of the two squad mates with him-- though they didn’t say a word the entire time.

Then a ‘tink’ noise drew his attention, and there in the middle of the street packed with civilian traffic he saw it.

A grenade.

He did not know whether it was American or Chinese or even stolen by the civilians, but it rolled and spinned, unnoticed near the feet of countless people, and suddenly Thorne was  _ running _ .  Shoving people aside, ignoring the shouts of his squad, he threw himself on top of the explosive.  He had no idea if he was interfering in an American op, or if these civilians had betrayed him to the Chinese soldiers.  In that moment, none of that much mattered.

When next he had any idea of  _ anything at all _ he was on his way to California with his guts freezing in his open belly.  He did not know if he’d managed to save any lives.  He did not ask.

Thorne had always been tough, and somewhat lucky.  The grenade had malfunctioned, causing only part of it to explode and the rest to simply  _ burn _ .  In California he was put back together with skin grafts and medically retired with the understanding that though the majority of his career had been largely resistant to critique, his judgement was called into question concerning his actions in the Chinese neighborhoods.  There’d been inquiries about  _ sympathies for the enemy _ and that if he had not been so critically wounded, an investigation would have likely followed.  He was  _ ordered _ to leave the west coast as soon as possible or face federal scrutiny for  _ espionage _ .  Thorne said nothing.  He made no protest.

He met Nora on the flight back to the New England Commonwealth.  Initially she took interest in him as a lawyer and the perceived violations of his rights by the Army to accuse him of such a serious crime on so little  _ if any _ evidence.  He was able to convince her that he desired no recompense and would not pursue a case.  Even so she would not leave him alone, she was fascinated with his story and further fascinated by his gentleness and love for poetry, which she shared.  Being much more forceful and driven, she later insisted they date, and six months later that they marry.  A month after that, she was pregnant with their son, Shaun.

Thorne often wondered if he felt like he ought to about them.  Nora was happy to make most of the decisions concerning their family, and he felt no real desire to overrule her.  Nora made being a husband and father easy.  She was the one who insisted he plug in with the VA and that he volunteer and become a speaker at their events with his insights.  He had no real protests.

He felt like a prisoner of a life he hadn’t really chosen.  Yet he hadn’t really  _ fought _ against his current circumstances.  He was tired of the fighting.  Drifting felt so much more natural.

He slept poorly most nights, his head full of the screaming of the dying.

Nora was patient and supportive.  Thorne was grateful to her.  Shaun was an amazing little person who fussed little and delighted in discovery.  He gave his father hope.

But when Thorne stumbled out of his cryogenic chamber, deep in the belly of Vault 111, and finally opened Nora’s across from him to discover her corpse-- and the corpses of everyone else who had once been his neighbors and acquaintances-- it was not loss of love that he felt, but a deep sense of  _ wrongness _ .  A great  _ wrong _ had been done, and a previously undiscovered sense of righteous anger flooded him as he promised his wife’s corpse that he would get their son back to safety.

It hurt him to think that he’d never really loved this woman who’d been so good to him.  He didn’t want to believe that he hadn’t.

As he made his way through the vault, once more surrounded by silent death, learning piece by piece the clever and terrible trick played on his entire neighborhood in their darkest and most desperate hour, a new, stronger mask forged itself over Thorne Hunter’s quiet, gentle, ripped-open and bleeding heart.


End file.
